Oblivion
Research Project (2022-present)
We prose a novel VR game, Oblivion which involves the users in a playful exploration using immersive real-world data. From a data-driven perspective, the game builds on the data of Tuvalu, and players have a critical role in addressing climate change by reflecting on what they experienced via gameplay. We evaluated the game concept, user experience, and design iteration ideas based on the preliminary playtesting results.
My Role: Game UX Designer/Researcher
Goals
• DQ: How can we translate real-world data into an immersive experience to visualise temporal-spatial dimensions of climate change in VR?
• RQ: How does the immersive visualisation of climate data influence the user’s perception and understanding of climate change?
System Design
The core concept of Oblivion is to promote climate change awareness by putting time in perspective by utilising the temporal-spatial affordances of VR. Thus along with visualising the effects of climate change, we aimed to bring this matter to a nearer time horizon for the users. As the name of the game implies, people are likely to be oblivious to their surroundings, and it is our goal to awaken their minds to the face of climate change. Rather than exposing players to a vivid display of a damaged world to raise immediate concern, we intend to show how subtle and hard to notice climate change can be from the human perspective.
Figure 2: Storyboard of the gameplay experience in Oblivion.
Procedure
Oblivion is disguised as an exploration game to keep the concept of the game secret for players to make sense of and create meaning of climate change at their own pace. We initially inform the players that they are winners of a four-day trip to an Island. The players may or may not understand the twist during the gameplay by completing simple tasks and catching the visible changes in the environment. It is not until the last phase of the game that the players discover the actual concept: that the island is Tuvalu and that visible climate change effects have occurred throughout their stay on the island. See Figure 2, 3, 4.
In the game, the player performs various tasks documenting the island’s experience by taking landscape pictures with a camera. Every morning the daily photo mission is updated, which consists of a list of new items the player needs to capture using the camera. While carrying out the missions, the player naturally observes and captures the moment of subtle climate changes on the island. The tasks direct the players to take pictures of the same elements repeatedly, for example, the sun in the sky and the seashore, so a comparison can be made later.
Figure 3: The daily mission engages players to carry out a series of tasks documenting the island’s experience. The players capture their beautiful in-game photographs using the photo mode, which later reveals the climate change message.
Figure 4: The players receive a photo album on the last day containing information that reveals that the virtual island is Tuvalu. With this, the players make sense of the photos they took on the island in the climate change context and reflect on the slowness and remoteness of climate change effects.
Immersive Data Visualisation
The motif of Oblivion is Tuvalu, one of the most climate vulnerable places in the world at risk of sinking. In Tuvalu, global warming and sea-level rise are the most significant threats, increasing ocean acidification and decreasing mangrove coverage. To create a VR environment based on real climate data, we collected four data types of Tuvalu from 1994 to 2021: sea level, temperature, ocean surface acidity, and mangrove coverage. Various data types over twenty-eight earth years were cleaned and mapped to four days in Oblivion. Then we visualised these data on spatial-temporal dimensions in the 3D space, as depicted in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Four real-world climate data of Tuvalu(from 1994 to 2021) mapped to four days in Oblivion: 1) sea level, 2) temperature, 3)ocean surface acidity and 4) mangrove coverage.
Playtesting &
Conclusion
We conducted prototype testing as an iterative process with internal stakeholders and playtesting sessions with players to gather feedback on Oblivion. We recruited 5 participants for the preliminary user study. For playtesting, the participants were first introduced to the game and asked to think out loud while playing Oblivion. Then, after experiencing the game, we conducted a semi-structured interview asking about their thoughts on the game concept and overall experience. Based on the feedback, we derived ideas for design iteration.
In the future, we will deploy qualitative methods to investigate our design question. To best understand this new design space and shed new light on utilising VR in tackling climate change, we adopt the participatory design approach, which emphasises co-research and co-design. We will conduct a semi-structured interview using a video prototype to elicit constructive feedback on the game concept and PD techniques. Next, we plan to utilise the iterated version of the game to conduct a user study, exploring the opportunities and challenges of VR in visualising climate change as an immersive experience and creating a playful experience to mitigate the challenges of climate change awareness.